Tuesday, April 30, 2013

This day we actually went 'swimming' in the ocean. We got into our bathing suits and went to yet another beach (by this time it felt like we had seen about 150 different beaches). This was a great beach for snorkeling. Too bad we didn't have any equipment. There was a reef which kind of stopped the waves from coming too powerfully into the shore so it made it easier to walk out into the water. But the reef was so close that it wasn't very deep. I'm not a fan of swimming in the ocean. I just don't like how my skin feels with the salt so we didn't do much ocean swimming.

The darker blue is the reef. You can see Tom standing out by the reef.

There was a boat lane and dock near the beach. So that channel was pretty deep.

It was a windy day that way too.

And from that beach we could see the Kilauea Lighthouse in the distance. We had visited that earlier in the week. After the beach we went back to the condo to get cleaned up because it was luau night. We went to Smith's Luau. Not exactly a Hawaiian name but they explained that they didn't use the Hawaiian name because no one would remember it. But everyone would remember Smith.

The Smith's property was thirty acres of gorgeous gardens. From 5pm to 6pm you could walk through the gardens and enjoy the scenery. Lots of flora and fauna to see.

This is an ahu ahhu statue. It was in the Polynesian section of the gardens.

At 6pm was the imu ceremony when they uncover the pig pit. So they scrap off all the sand and take out the pig.

At dinner we were serenaded by wonderful Hawaiian music. All you wanted to eat: Kahlua pork, terriyaki beef and a chicken dish, poi, and lomi lomi salmon. Lots of different desserts including rice pudding that was baked with the pig in the pit.
After dinner there was a show. Not many pictures of the show because the lighting wasn't good for pictures. But here is some of the cast after the show.

Tom was hoping to get his picture taken with the girls with the coconut bra. LOL! Hope you enjoy Day 8. Two more days to go! Thanks for stopping!

Sunday, April 28, 2013

WARNING! Picture Intensive! It's taken me days to get this post up because blogger wouldn't cooperate! It seems to be having trouble loading pictures. But finally, more pictures for you to enjoy.

Day 7 really kicked my butt! We wanted to see the NaPali Coast and there are only two ways to do it: hire a helicopter and hike. My Eagle Scout husband just had to hike that trail! Now this trail is not for the faint of heart. It's up and down cliffs often very rocky, steep and along the edge; muddy and wet in most of the places that you wish it weren't! The Kalalau trail is right off a very popular Hanakapi'ai Beach (don't ask me how it's pronounced!) so we had to park a half a mile from the start of the trail. You can go 11 miles out on this trail but we did the 2 miles to the farther beach with views of the coastline. Most people that do the 11 miles backpack in and stay overnight. There is a waterfall four miles in and if you start early enough you can do that in one day. I'm a wimp; we did just the two miles (and it took me 4 hours to do 4 miles). But the views were worth it!

This is the beach that we started from. Gorgeous sand beach and fairly calm waves. Of course there is always a sign that says dangerous rip tides and strong currents but there was a lifeguard on duty here. Lots of beaches don't have life guards.

So we started our climb and looking back this is the beach we had left behind.

This was one of the nicer spots along the trail: fairly level, not muddy. I just love all the jungle like atmosphere! And as usual Tom is taking a picture of me while I am taking a picture of him.

Here we are about a half mile from the start of the trail. With hours to go before us. Completely unsuspecting of what's to come. You can just start to get a glimpse of the coastline behind us.

Our first full glimpse of the NaPali coast.

And here's what most of the trail looked like only steeper!

Another coastline picture from atop the trail!

And finally out to the beach 2 miles from where we started. Can you see the little rock sculptures atop some of the rocks. They are like graffiti. There were tons of them among the rocks. Some were just to say "I was here," and other were tributes to the 81 people who died on this beach. There was actually a running tally on a sign.

If you crawled over all the rocks you got to Kalalau Beach. The waves were amazing out here. And the guys were taking a break from surfing. Now that's dedication to carry your surf board out here for 2 miles in and 2 miles out.

More of the gorgeous coastline!

Not many pictures on the way back. Too tired to pull out the camera. But I did get a picture of the trail sign on our return.

We visited Hanalei Bay on the drive back to our condo. Of course we had to walk this beach too. There was a lifeguard at this beach and the waves were rather low. Nice beach for swimming.

And gorgeous mountains in the background.

This is Hanalei National Wildlife Preserve. When they stopped growing taro on the island many of the water fowl lost their habitat. So this "farming project" brought back taro fields to help preserve some of the native wildlife. I loved the little plots and all the colors of the valley!

Friday, April 26, 2013

I’ve finally got back to card making! This first card I
don’t particularly like. I think my mojo left me after I returned from Hawaii or
I just couldn’t get back into the swing. I love the image from Doodle Pantry
but I’m not sure about the card.

The background paper is a chevron paper. The middle paper is stamped with a banner stamp from Simon Says April Stamp Kit and I embossed two stems with a Cuttle Bug embossing folder. The images and sentiment are from Doodle Pantry called Berry Mice.
I’m entering this card into these challenges:

That's it. I am off to Baby Creek in the hopes of getting more create time this weekend. I have some design team projects that must get finished. I tried last night to get day 7 of Hawaii up so stay tuned. Blogger would not cooperate. I'll try again on Sunday. Happy weekend!

Monday, April 22, 2013

We had no Internet for our last week in Hawaii so I had to wait until we arrived back home to finish adding pictures. Even though we arrived Saturday afternoon it's taking me some time to get my feet back on the ground and get used to the time change. And of course today it was back to work. So I'll try to get some more pictures up this week. Haven't had any creative time the past few days so nothing new to show in that arena. So sad! But here is our Day 5 in Hawaii.
We moved from our southern location in Waimea to a northern location in Princeville. While we stayed in a quaint little plantation cottage in the south, we moved to a very ultra modernly decorated condo in this very upscale community.

This was our last walk on Driftwood Beach right before we left Waimea. Kind of a cloudy day but always a great time walking on the beach. And a picture of Tom and I as we are getting ready to leave from the cottage.

There were some very cool trees all around the area.
We visited more beaches on our way up north. I think we visited at least 150 beaches in two weeks; at least it felt like that many. LOL!

And just for Tom we stopped at the harbor in Lihue so he could see a big container ship being loaded. He loves all things construction so here's one for him!

Heading northward we finally reached our condo with an ocean front view. While we could walk out to the beach at our southern location, our northern location was a bit more of a challenge; perched high atop a cliff.

That was the view from our lanai (patio). We could walk a short distance and see the sunset each evening. It was gorgeous!

This is the inside of the condo; the living room, kitchen and sitting room areas.

A view of the sunset that evening from high atop the cliff. the perfect way to end the day. Now I'm going to go see if I can get some crafting time in. Aloha!

Sunday, April 14, 2013

The image was provided for the challenge by Anji's Antics. I colored the moose with Copics. I added scraps of background paper and used my corner rounder and stamped some holly leaves in the corners. The sentiment is computer generated and cut with an ornament punch after being sponged with red die ink. I wanted to be sure I got this one posted before the end of the challenge. Have a wonderful Sunday! I'll be arriving back home from Hawaii next Saturday, April 20th. See you all then!

The weather turned nasty today with severe thunderstorm warnings and downpours of rain. The good news is that even though we were wet the temperatures aren't cold. It's been in the 60s and 70s. I think there will be more rain overnight and tomorrow. Tomorrow is a travel day for us. We'll be moving to a new location on the northern shore of Kauai in Princeville. But here's what we did today in the rain.
Our first stop was at a farmer's market near Lihue. It was raining cats and dogs but fortunately a friend told us to be sure to have rain gear before we left. So we have rain coats on had. The market was fun despite the rain. Beautiful plants and fruits and veggies for sale. Here are some of the flowers.

We bought a couple of fruit and vegetables there too. More about those shortly.

Our next stop was a little town called Koloa. It's mostly shops. We walked through and found a roasted nut shop. We bought some nuts. They had over 30 varieties and you could taste all of them. A couple of pictures in Koloa because we managed to get there when it wasn't raining.

They had some historical items on display that were kind of neat.

This was a laundry room a very long time ago.

We had lunch at a little restaurant called Grinds Cafe. One of my friends at home suggested we stop here. She had been to Kauai a number of times. Tom had a Kahlua pork skillet and I had a French Dip sandwich. Both were excellent and very filling. Afterwards we just took a drive in the rain.

You can see what kind of day it was. So we drove back to our cottage. After it stopped raining we took a three mail hike to the old Russian Fort. Sorry, no pictures. I had left my camera in case it rained again. But it really wasn't much more than a pile of rocks. It was built in the 1700s but abandoned in the 1860s. Not much left. It didn't rain until after we returned to the cottage so we had good timing.
Still full from lunch we decided on a light supper so we grilled up some pineapple from the farmer's market and some papaya and mango we bought at the grocery. It was so yummy off the grill. Tonight we are watching The Hobbit. And I can hear thunder in the distance once again.

As I said before, we move tomorrow and Tom didn't think we'd have Internet access so this may be my last post. If that's the case I'll have more pictures when we return home next Saturday. Thanks for reading through all this. Hope you have a wonderful week!
One last very gorgeous flower from today. This one we saw in Koloa.

Hiding in my Craft Room Challenges

the Alley Way stamps

Digital Delights by Louby Lou

Part Time Tuesday Challenge

The Cuttlebug Spot

CAS(E) this Sketch

Clearly Inspired Challenge

Stamp TV

Scor-Pal

About Me

I am a mother of three and married to the love of my life. My hobbies include papercrafting, crocheting and cross stitching. I love to make cards. I am soon to be a grandmother to twins, a boy and a girl.